Comments on the IR Emission from the Subarcsec Vicinity of SN 1987A

Speckle imaging in astronomy

“…According to some evolutionary models of the progenitor star of the SN, in which the star was at an earlier time a red supergiant (at the time of the supernova, it was blue), dust clumps would be left near the progenitor in the form of remnants from the red supergiant's stellar wind. In fact, weak infrared sources were detected within an arcsecond of the SN by Chalabaev et al [115], but clearly outside the region of the ejecta. The infrared temperatures for the sources were similar to what would be expected from hot dust.…”